Predictions: American Health Care and Fat People

Now that the ‘reform’ of Healthcare, i.e., delivering 1/6th of the American economy into the hands of government, has passed the House and been signed by the President, I want to make a prediction or two. These predictions are nothing new for this blog, and if you’re interested in my more general thoughts of the connections between various kinds of heathcare systems and the obesity epipanic, please read:

But I’m not here to yet again debate the merits (or demerits, in my view) of a universal system. We didn’t get a universal system with Sunday night’s signing: we got more of a Delayed Trojan Horse, which lays the groundwork for the system to be pushed in the direction of going single-payer, during Democrat-controlled Congresses and Administrations. But I’m not going to explain that right now, either, though there are scads of lovely posts on it on WSJ, Econ blogs, Cato, Mises, etc.

That being said, comments are closed.

So here my predictions on how we’re going to start seeing this new law change the cultural conversation about fat people.

In the short term: “You mean, I have to pay for YOUR fat ass, now? This sucks. I hate fatties, but I hate government more. Damned health insurance bill.” — oh, hai evidence, relying on the new Donna Simpson Straw Fatty Model, no less.

In the medium term: Increase of employer/government weight-loss ‘health’ initiatives; pouring money into weight-reduction schemes (esp. in public schools) sanctioned at a higher rate, getting more general public support; general stigmatization of ‘fatties’ for being fat, but a sense of compassion. Open derision of fat people as costing ‘more’ health dollars, as premiums skyrocket even higher, choice becomes less, it’s harder to find a good doctor, waiting times for appts increase, and so forth. Talk will begin to filter down that the regulatory boards should consider charging fat people more for health insurance, or not allowing them access to certain procedures because fatties who undergo those procedures ‘cost more’ than thinnies.

In the long term: When the anti-obese people ‘health’ initiatives don’t work to make fat people permanently thin, more drastic measures will be taken, all at high cost (which will gain the ire of taxpayers), with the ‘reasoning’ that some high cost, drastic measure like surgery is ‘necessary’ to ‘save lives and save more, chronic health expenditures down the road.’ We might have single payer by this time, which would compound the issue. Costs aren’t going to go down, so what you’ll see instead is rather than the government take responsibility for the fact that they’re going to destroy the system and explode costs with inefficiency and regulatory schemes, they’ll point the finger at some kind of scapegoat — you guessed it, the fatty. (cough, NHS, cough) Fatties will be banned from undergoing lots of ‘elective’ procedures (like fertility treatments, knee replacements, etc) unless they lose weight. There will be no competition, no recourse: the fatty will have no ability to go to another doctor or institution and perhaps be able to get it there, since the regulatory measures anti-competitively are ‘blanket’ measures (in order to ensure healthcare ‘equality,’ you know. Less for everyone, but especially those we deem to cost more by nature of their existence!). Government-controlled research institutions will, like the Big Pharma-backed institutions of yore, churn out anti-fat ‘research’ which is carefully structured in order to support their inevitable open discrimination against fat people. And so forth, however far down this slope you feel like sliding.

On Saturday I felt like much more of a human being than I do today, in America. Now, I feel a target on my back, because my government has decided that the way to cover the 10-15 million uninsured that have fallen through the cracks of the system (the 30 million number counts those who purposefully don’t buy insurance, as well as those who qualify for assistance but aren’t utilizing it) is to redistribute a massive chunk of wealth and regulate 1/6th of the economy, all the while ignoring smaller, more market-friendly steps that could have immediately increased access and lowered costs.

Thanks for giving the obesity epipanic in America a government club. Can’t wait for this to all pan out, surely in the fatties’ favor, if other countries with government medicine are any indication.